


Seventh Circle, Ninth Sphere

by AimeeLouWrites



Series: Divine Comedy [1]
Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII Remake (Video Game 2020)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Baby Cloud Strife, Canon-Typical Violence, Child Soldiers, Cloud Strife Needs a Hug, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Manipulation, Gen, Hostage Situations, Human Experimentation, Hurt/Comfort, Illustrations, It's like a Fix-It but I made it worse, Kidnapping, Non-Consensual Body Modification, Open to Interpretation, Possessive Behavior, Sephiroth (Compilation of FFVII) Being An Asshole, Sephiroth Being Sephiroth, Suicidal Thoughts, Time Travel, Time Travel Make-It-Worse, Unreliable Narrator, Whump, bonus epilogue, unless you're interpreting this in a pedo way in which case fuck off
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-16
Updated: 2020-11-08
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:13:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 12,647
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24745888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AimeeLouWrites/pseuds/AimeeLouWrites
Summary: Fact: the reason you can’t remember being a baby is because an infant’s brain is not developed enough to store episodic memories. This is true until roughly two years of age.Fact: even though you can’t remember them, experiences in your infant and toddler years predispose you to certain psychological states.Fact: when Cloud Strife is born, Sephiroth is ten years old.Fact: Gaia is not the only entity with enough power to make time travel a reality.—“Don’t bullshit me. You only gave them back to use against me.”Sephiroth hums, low and pleased. “Of course I did. I knew you couldn’t stay away any more than you could keep them at a distance. And you made more friends, didn’t you? You’ve even gone out of your way to save them from their inevitable decay. Oh Cloud. Tell me, what would you do to keep them?”
Relationships: Angeal Hewley & Cloud Strife, Genesis Rhapsodos & Cloud Strife, Sephiroth & Cloud Strife, Zack Fair & Cloud Strife
Series: Divine Comedy [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1804864
Comments: 192
Kudos: 531





	1. Sephiroth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cloud is six months old. Sephiroth takes what he wants.

When he opens his eyes, he is both timeless and ten years old. The harsh white lighting of his room ( _cell_ ) stings his retinas, making his cat-slit pupils contract into thin slivers. He inhales deeply—a necessary action for the first time in so very long. The air tastes of mako, antiseptic, and bleach.

The guards didn't ( _don't_ ) watch him through the security cameras all the time. Well-funded though Hojo is, he doesn’t have the manpower to waste on excessive surveillance. Whatever bored soldier is on duty is watching dozens of specimens, looking mostly for sudden movement or warnings from the monitoring systems. For this reason, they miss the slow, creeping smile that splits his face. 

Even if they'd noticed and had the good sense to be alarmed, it wouldn’t have saved them.

He rises from his bed and calmly rips the door from its housing. And really, he thinks as the screaming begins, punctuated by the liquid squelch of tearing flesh and the crunching of bone, what right do they have to complain? They wanted a god, and a god is what they got.

Pity they didn’t have the intelligence to understand that _creating_ a god and _controlling_ a god are two different things.

[ ](https://64.media.tumblr.com/e77cfb3bba341b1cf3c00d1d89c9d0e9/2419f15899ef6113-39/s540x810/fb71a256d494c89e81027d5b0ceba490e5a42585.jpg)

The lifeless monochrome gray of the basement complex is splattered liberally with blood red and mako green by the time he is finished. He works feverishly over the security center in the control room, standing astride the corpse of the late security chief. Flecks of blood spot the monitors as his stained fingers fly over the keys. Hojo’s paranoia and territoriality over his research are working in Sephiroth’s favor: with some minor interference on his part, no one will even suspect the demise of the research team, much less send SOLDIERs or Turks to try and “put him down.”

His lips quirk at the thought. How cute.

He straightens from his bowed position, rolling his shoulders. It’s strange to be confined to an actual, mortal form again. He glances down at the white scrubs ( _white no longer_ ) that cover his child’s body, then reaches up and absently picks a chunk of Hojo’s thoracic vertebrae from where it’s tangled in his hair. Well. He has plenty of time to spare. No reason not to shower and change into something more appropriate before moving on to his next task.

* * *

“Mother,” Sephiroth croons, laying his hand on the tank. There’s no shrine, not yet, and now not ever. There is merely his Mother, suspended in Hojo’s machinery as the mako siphons through her. No answering whisper sings in his mind, but he looks on fondly nonetheless.

Jenova gave him life. Jenova gave him the power to wind time through his fingers and bend it to his will. Now, he’ll take _everything_ Jenova has to give.

Tainted mako spills out in a hissing wave around his boots as he slashes the tank open with a commandeered broadsword. Her dormant body sags around the machinery like sodden cardboard. He reaches out, pressing one small palm to her decayed cheek in a tender gesture.

Her power becomes his ( _again_ ), and Jenova is no more. He is alone.

But not for long.

* * *

Cloud Strife is a pale-skinned infant, fast asleep in a rough wooden cradle. It’s February, so the six-month-old is swathed in Nibel furs against the early spring chill. His eyes, when they flutter open, are an infant’s grey-blue, not yet the bright sapphire they will be. They are certainly not ringed in mako green, shining from the inside like disks of colored glass catching the sun.

There’s no recognition in Cloud’s face as he gazes up at his former equal ( _his god, his everything, even if he refuses to admit it_ ), but that is only to be expected. His brain hasn’t yet developed the structures necessary to house his episodic memory, much less rewired itself to accommodate the memories of the man Sephiroth carried all this way. He won’t know ( _won’t resist him_ ) for years yet.

Sephiroth stares down in open fascination. 

“Good to see you, Cloud,” he murmurs breathlessly, stroking the back of one finger along a downy, baby-pink cheek the same way he caresses Masamune’s blunt spine. Cloud blinks sleepily, squirming, and latches onto the finger with one tiny hand. His grip is appallingly weak.

“Don’t worry,” Sephiroth croons, gently freeing his hand to begin bundling the furs around his lifelong enemy ( _sole and eternal_ _equal_ ). It wouldn’t do to let his most precious possession be damaged on the way back to the lab. “Soon, you’ll be stronger than you ever could have dreamed. Is that not what you’ve always wanted? What you’ve only _ever_ wanted?” 

Cloud snuffles as Sephiroth lifts him from the cradle. Even with several sturdy furs, the bundle weighs practically nothing. He can’t resist pushing them away to gaze down into that little, uncomprehending face. “All this for you, Cloud,” he promises in a reverent whisper as those hazy gray eyes blink up at him. “Only ever for you.”

* * *

He returns to the labs with his prize, easily skirting past the oblivious support staff in the mansion proper before descending back into the basement. Cloud sneezes at the pungent miasma of slowly decaying viscera mixed with acrid mako. Sephiroth strokes an absent hand through baby-fine blond hair as he reads through Hojo’s notes. He can’t afford to make a mistake with this.

In the end, though, it’s simple enough: Sephiroth’s blood, as well as refined mako laced with his cells, are all he needs to ensure the return of his equal to his side, even if he must wait a few years to see that power grow to full bloom. Cloud will be stronger than ever before, a true challenger even with Sephiroth incarnate and fully possessed of his Mother’s power. The very thought makes his blood sing in anticipation, but he must be patient.

“Soon,” he promises the infant dozing in his arms. Abruptly, he wonders if his ten-year-old body is affecting him more than he assumed it would. He certainly doesn’t remember his adult body ever feeling this… giddy.

No matter. He rips a plexiglass viewing dome from a demolished cage and rigs a makeshift cradle from it, then sets about preparing the injections and calibrating the mako tank ( _the same tank that gave him his own enhancements_ ) for its next ( _last, tiny_ ) inhabitant.

* * *

When a familiar presence stirs finally ( _finally_ ) to life in the back of his mind, S-cells integrating into the tiny form floating curled-up in the green light of the tank, Sephiroth’s breath catches in his throat. Little blue eyes flutter open behind the full-face breathing mask, just for a moment, meeting his enthralled gaze before sliding shut once more.

Sephiroth decides he’s never seen anything as beautiful as those blue irises ringed with mako green.

* * *

[ ](https://imgur.com/W1JHGe8)


	2. Angeal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cloud is six. Angeal spectates.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoops, I made it worse!  
> Trigger warning for suicidal themes at the end.

[ ](https://imgur.com/Kavhkmv)

* * *

At sixteen, SOLDIER First Class Sephiroth is a terror both on the battlefield and off. He leads ShinRa’s armies as if it amuses him, as if he’s indulging in a childish game when he routes supply lines and discusses strategy. He does not bother with integrating into the ranks—the brass simply set him loose on the enemy and then clean up whatever he doesn’t annihilate. He might as well be a one-man army for how much the actual army is needed to back him up. Some of the men fear him more than they respect him; some respect him more than they fear him. He doesn’t seem to care either way, only ever concerning himself with his little shadow.

At six, SOLDIER First Class Sephiroth’s little shadow is simply a terror. No one on either side of the conflict knows what to make of him. His name is Cloud, the SOLDIERs and infantrymen know, and his spiky blond locks barely crest the hips of even the shortest SOLDIER. He watches the world with ancient, sober blue-green eyes that shine as brightly as any First Class. He wields two long knives that seem like swords in his tiny hands. He speaks with the quiet reserve of a sixty-year-old veteran and a little boy's high voice. 

There’s not a force in the universe that can keep him from the battlefield, and very few that can stop him on it. The Wutai call him Dragonling. ShinRa call him Stormcloud.

Some of the soldiers try to keep him away in the beginning days, horrified to the core that a six-year-old would even be with the army in Wutai, much less actually on the battlefield. SOLDIER Second Class Angeal Hewley, a young man fast-tracked to First Class along with SOLDIER Second Class Genesis Rhapsodos, is the most vocal of these men, unafraid to ream into Sephiroth for allowing ( _ encouraging _ ) it. The silver-haired First just looks amused at the teenager’s honor-fueled tirade, but Cloud seizes Angeal’s hand and drags him away for a private conversation. They speak at length, though what exactly is said no one but them knows.

Angeal quietly drops his objections.

On every level, from the Generals to the lowest army grunts, rumors dog the gold-and-silver duo’s steps. There are whispers of how the ShinRa Mansion had burned to nothing just after Hojo sent them off to officially join SOLDIER (and had he really sent  _ them?  _ Or had Sephiroth simply taken Cloud instead of no for an answer). Every single scientist, soldier, and support staff member had died, leaving only Sephiroth and Cloud as witnesses to what occurred in Nibelheim. Sephiroth had been fourteen at the time, and Cloud only four. It’s said that Hollander, new head of the Science Department, took charge of them, but the SOLDIERs who’ve done rotations in the Science levels tell a different story. Hollander has no power over them. Heidegger has no power over them.

The boldest men whisper that even President ShinRa himself has no power over them.

Angeal and Genesis are the only ones with any inkling of the true nature of the gold-and-silver duo, the former because he stubbornly insists on looking after Cloud to the best of his abilities and the latter because he’s entertained enough by the situation to accompany his friend on his lost cause of a mission. And the truth?

The truth is that no one but Sephiroth has any power over Cloud, and Sephiroth only does exactly what he wants to.

* * *

“Hewley, Rhapsodos,” says Cloud by way of greeting, cat eyes not looking up from where he’s cleaning his blades. The Wutaian soldiers lay dead around him, most killed by his hand, while Sephiroth looms behind him like a self-satisfied silver specter. The First had declared the skirmish ‘Cloud’s playtime’ and left the bulk of the killing to the child, much to Angeal’s displeasure. Even Genesis had looked a bit perturbed by that.

Angeal kneels, ignoring the wet squelch of the blood-soaked mud beneath his knee. “Let me see your arm,” he says, “and I’ve told you a hundred times to call me Angeal.” He’s learned by now that he must completely ignore Cloud’s objections to his ‘mothering’ or he’ll never get anything done. Cloud only bends to polite bulldozing, so he gently seizes the six-year-old’s arm without waiting for it to be offered, unbuckling the tiny materia bracer to get at the deep puncture beneath. Swiping up a bit of the dribbling blood with his index finger, he sniffs it and then clicks his tongue. “Poisoned,” he says, sounding more tired than worried. “It’s a new one too.”

“Ah,” says Cloud as his eyes return to their normal, round-pupil state. He sheaths his knives in an efficient movement, then promptly leans over and vomits red-speckled bile. “Makes sense.”

Sephiroth is not even remotely alarmed by this development. Neither, by this point, are Angeal, Genesis, or indeed Cloud himself. Small and young though Cloud is, he has as much mako in him as a First Class. It’s hard to sicken him, and harder still to kill him. He’s stoic in the face of his sudden poisoning, despite the blood that begins to stream from his nose.

“Alright, let’s get you to Medical,” Angeal sighs, passing the bracer off to Genesis before sweeping the trembling six-year-old into his arms. “We’ll see if they can get an antidote from you.”

Such events are depressingly common where Cloud is concerned. In truth, Angeal might have simply snatched him up and vanished into the night, consequences be damned, if not for what the boy had told him all those weeks ago.

_ “Hewley,” says the unnaturally serious child, pushing him to sit in a chair in the Officer’s Tent with strength that no normal boy should have. Like this, they are nearly eye level with each other. “Listen to me. Whatever you think you’re preventing, it’s too late. Don’t pick a fight with Sephiroth. You’re not going to win. I’m here, I am what I am, and now I need to get stronger.” _

_ Angeal’s hackles go up. “You shouldn’t need to _ — _!” _

_ “It. Is. Too. Late!” Cloud snaps, planting his tiny fists on his hips. “Shouldn’t is a useless word right now, SOLDIER, because I do need to. I’ll say it one more time: whatever you’re trying to prevent has already happened. It is too late.” _

_ Angeal shuts his eyes, drawing in a calming breath as he tries not to lose it. “Cloud,” he says in a soft, strained voice, “You’re only six. No matter what happened to you, six is hardly too late to give up on having a childhood.” _

_ The blond’s pupils elongate as the green ring around them lights up like fireworks. “Yes,” he says firmly, “it is.” _

Once Angeal understands that Cloud is there by his own volition (Sephiroth’s involvement notwithstanding) what is he supposed to do? He doesn’t doubt that the boy would go find the biggest threat available and fight it no matter where Angeal might take him. He seems determined to ‘get stronger,’ though he has yet to actually divulge why, despite Angeal’s persistent and unsubtle prodding.

Sephiroth seems to be both in the know and amused about it. After every battle, he and Cloud have an exchange that goes something like this:

“Are you strong enough yet, Cloud?”

“No. Not yet.”

“Hm. You had best keep fighting, then.”

It’s oddly ritualistic. Neither Angeal nor Genesis understand it. “Strong enough for what?” Genesis wonders aloud in their shared tent one day, tossing a fire materia from hand to hand. “He’s only six and he’s already as strong as a Third. No doubt he’ll be as strong as Sephiroth when he’s our age. What kind of ridiculous standard has that boy set for himself?”

Angeal shuts his eyes and braces his elbows on his knees, cradling his head in his hands. He thinks of the dead, numb expression that always,  _ always  _ crosses Cloud’s face when his eyes go catty; of the ruthless, unflinching way he sweeps through a field of dead and dying men; of the hungry gleam in Sephiroth’s eye when he watches Cloud send the Wutaian soldiers running for their lives.

Most of all, though, he thinks of the night before and what he was not meant to see. 

He thinks of the way the six-year-old fell to silent, shattered pieces in the deep of midnight, Sephiroth away on a mission and Cloud unaware anyone was watching him—fingers white, digging hard into tiny knees, head bowed as he shuddered without letting a single sound escape his lips. 

He thinks of the way Cloud’s hand darted to grasp the hilt of his knife, drawing it in a single desperate jerk. Of the way it moved to press tip-first over his heart, only to freeze in place and then fall when his fingers rose one-by-one from the hilt, as if someone had been forcefully prying his hand open.

Angeal doubts he’ll ever again hear anyone weep the way Cloud did that night. He certainly wasn’t meant to.

“I don’t know, Gen,” he says, sounding defeated even in his own ears. “And I don’t think I could take it if I did.”


	3. Zack

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cloud is twelve, Zack is fourteen. Surely a friendship is inevitable?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jesus I made it even worse. I thought I'd hit the bottom, but apparently not.

Cloud, in Zack’s estimation, is a very, _very_ weird little kid. Tiny and towheaded, he carries a sword bigger than himself and looks at the world with far too serious blue eyes. He skulks around the ShinRa building at all hours of the day and night, sometimes alone but more often with one of the ‘Holy Trinity’ trailing after him like ominous superpowered babysitters.

The civilian ShinRa staff don’t know what to make of Cloud. He’s young and sweet-looking, like a little golden chocobo chick, but also grim-faced and obviously dangerous. Some of the secretaries, usually the older ones who have seen too much ShinRa bullshit to be phased by anything anymore, like to fuss over him and give him sweets. Most treat him politely but warily. The few that condescend or sneer tend to get quickly reassigned.

The Wutai veterans, on the other hand, gossip enough that no one in the armed forces underestimates him, not even the greenest cadets. They’d made him sound so _fearsome,_ as badass as any of the Commanders or even the General himself. Seeing him in person for the first time had been quite a shock. Zack had thought they were exaggerating about his dinky size but no, if anything the vets were being generous. The top of his head _maybe_ comes up to Zack’s chest. Which says a lot, since Zack is only fourteen and has had a grand total of one mako treatment so far. 

Technically, Cloud is a SOLDIER Third Class like Zack, and is officially under the mentorship of Sephiroth. Weirdly though, it’s Zack’s own mentor, Angeal, who seems to look after Cloud the most. Sure, the Silver General spars ( _fights?_ ) with Cloud a lot (they break the sims on a weekly basis, maintenance hates them with a burning passion and is not quiet about it), but…that’s it. Angeal is the one who arranges Cloud’s class schedule, who runs him through katas in the First Class gym, and who takes him to Medical (read: manhandles him there) when he gets injured. Even Commander Rhapsodos seems to pitch in more than Sephiroth, giving the kid lessons in fine-tuning his materia control every weekend.

Zack doesn’t get it, but he’s also not sure he wants to. The one time he asked Angeal, the man’s jaw had tightened and it had taken him several seconds to gather his thoughts. “Sephiroth and I don’t...see eye-to-eye on the issue of Cloud, Zack,” he’d said. Then, with a sigh, “and neither does Cloud, frankly. I’m trying to protect him, I suppose, as much as I can, but… he, _they_ , only tolerate so much.” He’d smiled a bit, putting a hand on Zack’s shoulder. “Maybe you can help me, hm, puppy? Cloud could do with a friend who will encourage him to act a bit more his age.”

So. Weird kid, needs help _being_ a kid for some reason, but if anyone is up to the task, it’s Zack Fair, extraordinaire!

Easier said than done. Cloud gets all... _extra_ weird around him when he runs up in the halls, yelling “Cloudy!” His eyes go all catty and he kinda freezes and then ducks his head to hide his face beneath his hair. And it happens every. _Single._ _Time!_ All the way up until Cloud starts actively _avoiding_ him!

And Zack _knows_ he’s being actively avoided because he keeps getting glimpses of chocobo-butt hair or wide blue-green eyes, only to round the corner and find them mysteriously gone. Thankfully Genesis and Angeal shortly catch on and put a stop to Cloud’s schemes, snagging the twelve-year-old by the harness and holding him in place long enough for Zack to get there and attach himself to the blond like a loud, sociable, impossible-to-remove octopus.

_Ha! Take that, new friend!_

So Cloud tries a different strategy: total silence paired with a Third Class helmet that’s _way_ too big for him and frankly makes him look like one of those SOLDIER bobbleheads you can buy in the ShinRa gift shop on the ground floor. It’s _definitely_ not correctly proportioned to allow him to actually see out of it. His new strategy lasts all of one day before he runs face-first into a door while trying to dodge a Zack-tackle (a Zackle, if you will). Genesis still giggles randomly sometimes when he thinks of it.

Making friends is an art form, a learned skill, because there are all kinds of people in the world. Some people are naturally shy and standoffish. Some people get overwhelmed by Zack’s sheer boisterousness. He gets it, he’s learning to be a better friend to those kinds of people, but with Cloud...it isn’t Zack’s _personality_ that’s causing the trouble. Zack may be distractable and hyper, but he’s far from stupid. He can tell when something is off. So when the weeks progress and he makes no inroads with Cloud _whatsoever_ , despite his best efforts, he becomes...concerned.

Cloud is _very deliberately_ not being friends with Zack. He doesn’t understand why. The kid isn’t hostile or afraid of him. It’s not shyness or sensory overload. It’s definitely not apathy. He thinks for a long time, deep and hard, about the exact expressions that cross Cloud’s face when he’s around, but his final conclusion makes _no sense_. 

Cloud is trying to protect him from something, and if he’s correct that something is _Cloud himself._

But why? Cloud may be a very capable and experienced killer (which Zack tries not to think about too hard) but he’s still a sweet kid, at least according to Angeal. He doesn’t have a mean bone in his body. So why worry about hurting Zack?

His first impulse is to sit on the twelve-year-old until he ‘fesses up, but lately Angeal’s been harping on about ‘tact’ and ‘subtlety,’ so he reins himself in and goes to his mentor first. The older man blinks when Zack explains the problem and his theory. An odd expression crosses his face, as if he’s just realized something important.

“I think you’re right, Zack,” he says softly. He draws in a deep breath, closing his eyes for a moment as Zack watches curiously. “Gaia. I’ve known that boy since he was six and he still…” He laughs with an edge of hysteria.

“...‘Geal?” Zack asks worriedly, brows coming together.

“It’s nothing,” Angeal says, shaking his head. “But you’re right. I think we’re going to have to ambush him with this one. He’s being remarkably avoidant.”

Zack frowns, rubbing the back of his neck. “Both of us? Um, I dunno, do you think we should? Feels like a dick move.”

“Language,” the older man says automatically, but his thoughts are clearly elsewhere. After a moment of silence, he decides: “you’re coming over for dinner tonight. We'll do it after. There’s no reason to put this off.”

Zack frowns, but nevertheless agrees. Angeal has known Cloud for much longer than he has and is also, you know, an actual adult. He'll defer to his mentor's judgment.

That night, Cloud lets himself into Angeal’s apartment as per usual. Then he glances up from his PHS and spies Zack fidgeting nervously on the couch and either Zack is very easy to read or Cloud knows him better than he thought, because those blue-green eyes immediately go catty in alarm. He turns and bolts for the door. 

Zack barely has time to blink in shock before Angeal appears out of nowhere, yanking the twelve-year-old to a halt with a hand curled into the collar of his oversized tee. “You stop that, young man,” he says sternly.

“Let me go, Angeal,” Cloud says in a soft, uneasy voice.

“No.” Angeal marches him over to the couch, lifting the boy’s feet from the floor entirely when he starts to pull against his hold. “Sit. If you’re going to act like this then we need to have the discussion now.” 

Zack watches in growing alarm as Cloud actually _squirms out of his shirt_ and makes another break for it. He’s never seen the blond so frantic.

Apparently his mentor has though, because the man deftly catches the other side of the discarded shirt and loops it around Cloud’s torso in a movement almost too fast to see, yanking him back. Cloud grunts, staggering. As strong as he is, he’s still tiny and light, especially compared to Angeal. The older man drops the shirt, snagging Cloud’s arms and wrestling him onto the couch.

Now Zack gets why Angeal said they needed to ambush him. He bites his lip nervously, feeling helpless as he watches the mismatched duo tussle. Cloud’s near-desperate expression makes his heart hurt.

“Stop it,” Angeal commands, kneeling in front of the couch both to box the twelve-year-old in and to force him to make eye contact. His hands engulf Cloud’s slender wrists completely, thumbs overlapping fingers with plenty of room to spare. “No one is going to hurt you.”

The look Cloud shoots him is both exasperated and terrified.

Luckily, Zack is fluent in Cloud-speak by now. “Then what are you scared of, Cloudy?” he asks, scooching closer across the cushions. “It’s just talking.”

Cloud presses his mouth into a thin line, color bleeding from his lips, and ducks beneath his hair. He’s no longer struggling against Angeal’s grip, but his shoulders are drawn up defensively around his ears. Zack reaches out, hesitates, then lays a hand on his head. Every line in the boy’s body screams with tension.

“Cloud…”

“Stop,” he whispers, balling his hands into fists. “Let me go.”

Zack takes a deep breath, feeling the fine tremors running through his friend, and decides to go out on a limb. “Cloudy, please. Why are you scared of hurting me?”

Cloud’s head jerks up, surprised, and knocks the older boy’s hand away. “What?”

“You’re scared of hurting me, right?” says Zack, resisting the urge to fidget with his hair. “That’s why you keep running away all the time.” 

Except apparently not, if the look the blond is giving him is any indication. “I’m... not scared of me hurting you, no,” Cloud says slowly.

Something is off about his phrasing. Zack frowns, running the words through his mind and considering them carefully, but Angeal catches on almost immediately. The man inhales sharply, drawing both boys’ attention back to him. 

“Who are you scared will hurt Zack, Cloud?” he asks, shifting his grip so that he’s holding both of the blond’s small hands in his own, restraint turned to encouragement. He asks as if he already knows, ducking into Cloud’s line of sight when he tries to look away. “Cloud? Who are you scared of? Who would hurt Zack if he got close to you?”

Zack notices that Cloud is gripping Angeal’s hands back now, holding on to them like a lifeline. His stomach flips uncomfortably as he waits for Cloud’s reply. None of his fear is for himself. 

“You know who,” Cloud whispers, curling even further in on himself to avoid the older man’s intense gaze.

Angeal releases one of Cloud’s hands, guiding it to grip the other before he tips the twelve-year-old’s chin up and gently forces him to make eye contact. “I need you to tell me in words,” he says. “Who are you afraid would hurt Zack?”

Cloud shuts his eyes in defeat, slumping into Angeal’s grip. Zack’s heart leaps into his throat and stays there as the boy draws in an unsteady breath and whispers a single name, nearly too quiet to hear.

“Sephiroth.”

* * *

[ ](https://imgur.com/Uk2elpv)


	4. Genesis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From six to sixteen, Genesis sees the worst of what Cloud endures.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me to myself: can't get much worse, right?  
> Myself to me: ...girl, have you read your own writing?

In another life, Genesis Rhapsodos would have looked at Sephiroth and seen a glorious rival. He would have seethed with jealousy and admiration, chasing after the General in an unwinnable race to the ultimately hollow title of ‘Hero.’ He would have considered himself the only man capable of one day surpassing Sephiroth in strength and skill and he would have done his damnedest to prove it.

This is not that life.

* * *

Angeal is barely sixteen when he adopts Cloud as his own, though he’d hardly admit it outright. Genesis has been Angeal’s closest friend long enough to know what’s really happening, though. At first, it’s because of Angeal’s ever-so-important Honor: it’s not _honorable_ to have a six-year-old fighting your wars, so it’s his duty to do something. Then it’s because of compassion, the helpless sort that wants to fix the problem but is unable to. Then, finally, it’s because of the simple, deep love the little boy inspires in Angeal. 

And Cloud  _ is  _ lovable, Genesis freely admits. Lovable in the way one loves a stoic feral kitten sitting out in the cold rain, but lovable nonetheless. The way his serious little face scrunches up in puzzlement whenever the SOLDIERs try to care for him is both heartbreaking and endearing. It’s as if he can’t fathom someone voluntarily looking after him. Or, rather, that he cannot fathom why someone would (in his own words) ‘waste the effort.' Even Genesis can’t keep a neutral expression at that one.

He intends, at the beginning of everything in Wutai, to stay detached from the situation. He will amuse himself by watching and supporting Angeal’s doomed crusade, but Cloud is on his own as far as he’s concerned. From him, the boy will get nothing more than the mutual support all SOLDIERs share. Little though he is,  _ Stormcloud’s _ strength is easily on the level of a Third. It isn’t as if he needs help.

Right?

* * *

The Wutai war is at its height. Angeal is busy out in the field, running one of the newly-arrived platoons through drills. Sephiroth whisked Cloud off for some one-on-one training earlier, and Genesis himself is on break until Angeal returns. He hums quietly, ankle over knee, as he reads Loveless in a little clearing near the edge of camp where the silver-and-gold duo disappeared earlier. When he’s halfway through the first act, the wind shifts, carrying the metallic tang of mako-infused blood to his nose. He startles, closing the book with a snap and surging to his feet, head whipping toward the smell.

But there’s no sign that they’re under attack. It’s only Sephiroth, walking steadily back into camp, his coat stained red and wrapped around a limp body in his arms. A few damp golden spikes poke out from the bunched-up collar. For a moment Genesis’s heart stutters in his chest, expecting the worst, but Sephiroth’s expression is calmly pleased, a slight smile playing about his lips. 

“Genesis,” he says, nodding in greeting. Blood drips steadily from the bundle in his arms, splattering across his boots. He doesn’t seem to notice. “Has Angeal returned?”

“Not yet,” says Genesis, sounding far calmer than he feels. He’s unable to tear his eyes away from the spot where Cloud’s head is hidden behind black leather. Sephiroth, he knows, is domineeringly possessive of the six-year-old. Surely he wouldn’t be so calm if the boy were dead?

“Hm,” says Sephiroth. The bundle is thrust into Genesis’s arms with no warning. He takes it automatically, choking quietly as the overwhelming smell of copper and mako stings his throat. “I’ll leave this to you, then.”

Genesis doesn’t see where Sephiroth goes after that. He’s too busy sprinting for his tent and the materia stash inside. It’s closer than Medical. He’ll take Cloud after if necessary. 

The body feels warm in his arms. If there’s a heartbeat, he can’t hear it over the roar in his ears.  _ Be alive,  _ he prays, running for all he’s worth.  _ Oh Goddess, please let him be alive.  _ Bursting through the tent flaps, he quickly but carefully lays the bundle on his bed, ignoring the blood that soaks into the standard-issue sheets, and dives for his materia.

He casts for a long time. He’s not sure how long, actually. The minutes blur into a hazy mess as he returns limbs to their sockets, staunches internal bleeding, and seals long slash marks. His hands turn crimson with Cloud’s blood as he’s forced to physically realign snapped bones so that the jagged ends can fuse together properly. At some point he leans over and vomits before turning back to his work.

_ “Rhapsodos.”  _

A small, bruised hand gently touches his bracer. He startles badly, head swimming. The tent spins in a circle around him. He over-cast again. Blinking the black spots away, he manages to focus on Cloud’s face. Blue eyes, the green around the circular irises dulled from severe blood loss. Round cheeks pale as milk. Genesis needs to get him to Medical. He needs more than just materia to fix—

“Rhapsodos,” the boy repeats patiently, and he refocuses. “Stop it. That’s enough.” A little finger pushes against his forehead and the Second falls back on his ass with a thud. 

“You over-cast,” Cloud explains soothingly, as if Genesis is the one who needs to be calmed and looked after. The little boy lays still in the bloody cradle of Sephiroth’s coat as he speaks, smart enough not to try and sit up. “Let’s just wait here until Angeal gets back, alright?”

Either Angeal’s repeated pestering finally worked, or Cloud is trying to calm Genesis down by using his best friend’s first name. Probably the latter, knowing Cloud. It works, to a degree, as he draws in a deep breath and realizes how shallow and fast all the preceding ones were. He takes another for good measure, then speaks.

“Cloud,” he says, voice rasping as if he’s been screaming for hours. “What was that?”

The blond’s expression shutters abruptly, and it’s remarkably akin to watching the emergency bay doors in the Science Department slam shut. “You’re exhausted,” Cloud says evenly. “Let’s discuss this later.”

But Genesis is not Angeal, whose inquiries are as gentle as a river wearing down a stone, effective in persistence. Genesis is fire and temper. Genesis  _ pushes  _ until he gets what he wants, and Cloud is not exempt just because he’s six. Fury sparks in his chest, replacing the focused panic that likely saved the boy’s life. “Cloud,” he repeats, leaning forward and bracing one arm on his upturned knee.  _ “What was that?” _

Cloud sighs irritably, tilting his head toward the ceiling. A hand-shaped bruise lingers on the pale column of his throat. Sephiroth did this, that much is clear. But what Genesis doesn’t know, what he  _ will find out,  _ is why. He dreads hearing the word  _ punishment  _ fall from Cloud’s pale lips _.  _ Perhaps he should have feared his own lack of imagination, because what Cloud actually says in his calm little voice is—

“It was a reward.”

There’s nothing left in his stomach. He leans over and throws up again anyways.

* * *

Genesis keeps his mouth firmly shut about the incident and is rewarded by Cloud coming to him for help whenever Sephiroth does especially serious damage. Genesis is not good with children, but then Cloud hardly acts like a child. He recites Loveless as he works, more to keep himself calm than to keep Cloud calm. Before long the boy is completing lines with him. By the time a ceasefire is negotiated and they return to Midgar, Cloud knows Loveless cover to cover and Genesis has long since lost count of the number of bones he’s mended and cuts he's sealed.

The ShinRa brass officially commend him for his unexpected mastery of field triage and materia healing. He burns the commendation letter.

Carefully, subtly, he contributes to Angeal’s efforts when Cloud is officially folded into the ranks of SOLDIER. He shadows the boy when necessary ( _babysitting_ ) and gives him materia lessons on the weekends. He patches Cloud up at least once a week before sending him off to Angeal to pretend nothing is wrong. His hands shake occasionally when he mops the child’s blood up from his floor. It’s worth it, he thinks, to keep this much from burdening his oldest friend. He has no doubt that if Angeal knew everything Cloud freely endured, he would die trying to kill Sephiroth.

When he can, he shields Cloud from the General, taking him out of Midgar for training. It’s real training, of course. It has to be, since Cloud won’t allow for anything less. But like this, Genesis can at least make sure there are no broken bones to fix or neat rows of lacerations to heal. He, unlike the Demon ( _ oh, how fitting a nickname _ ), can push the boy to his limits without using cruelty as a crutch.

To no one’s surprise, Cloud blitzes through the ranks. By twelve, he's the strength of a First, with only his age holding him back from the higher ranks. By fourteen, he's a Second and easily as deadly as Genesis and Angeal, if not more so. The boy never spars ( _ fights _ ) all out with anyone but Sephiroth. On his sixteenth birthday, he's promoted to First and ties Sephiroth for the distinction of youngest First in SOLDIER history. His childhood nickname of Stormcloud sticks within SOLDIER’s ranks, but to the fan clubs—and, occasionally, ShinRa propaganda—he’s known as  _ The Golden Archangel,  _ or simply  _ Archangel. _

Cloud's cheeks remain softly rounded with lingering youth, but his eyes settle into a permanently slit state around his fifteenth year, aquamarine to the General's jade. He is gentle and kind and utterly deadly. His expression habitually sits between grim and grieving. He commands troopers and SOLDIERs alike with quiet, compelling charisma. Genesis can see Angeal’s influence in him, at times.

Yet still, he pushes himself toward greater strength with an intensity that borders on desperate. Genesis never quite understands why, until one day he overhears a conversation between Cloud and Sephiroth.

“Are you not grateful, my Cloud?” Sephiroth asks in response to something Genesis did not hear. “Did I not return them to you, whole and hale?”

Cloud draws in a shuddering breath and Genesis knows him well enough to feel the anguished fury in it. “Don’t bullshit me. You only gave them back to  _ use against me _ .”

Sephiroth hums, low and pleased. “Of course I did. I knew you couldn’t stay away any more than you could keep them at a distance. And you made  _ more  _ friends, didn’t you? You’ve even gone out of your way to save them from their inevitable decay. Oh Cloud. Tell me, what would you do to keep them?”

“They were  _ your  _ friends too, asshole!” Cloud snaps, a note of desperation in his voice. Genesis presses a hand over his mouth. What in the Goddess’s name is he listening to?

“ _ Were,  _ yes. You forget, my Perfect Storm, that they betrayed and abandoned me first. What loyalty do I owe the pale shadows of traitors?”

A pause, another ragged breath, then: “I’m not strong enough yet. Let them make me stronger. Isn’t that what you want?”

Sephiroth laughs and it sends a horrible chill crawling across Genesis’s skin. The hand over his mouth presses down until he can taste blood against his teeth. “Oh Cloud,” Sephiroth repeats, almost fond. “Very well then. Come, show me your weakness.”

They leave together, boots rapping across the tile. Genesis sinks to the ground, the conversation playing through his head on a loop. 

_ What would you do to keep them? _

_ Come, show me your weakness. _

He knew, or suspected at least, the true dynamic of their relationship, but  _ this— _

He buries his face in his hands, helpless and furious and dizzy with the force of it. Pulling one hand away, he conjures a fire in the cradle of his palm just for something to focus on. He lets the world narrow to a pinprick until the fire is white-hot but perfectly controlled, growing and ebbing in sync with his breaths.

“Cloud,” he whispers to the empty hallway, flames spitting in his hand. “Why won’t you tell us how to help you?”


	5. Cloud

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cloud speaks.

Cloud is two ( _and a half!_ ) years old, and he…

No…no, Cloud is twenty-six. He’s twenty-six and he’s—

Cloud’s head hurts _so bad._ A baby is crying nearby except no, that’s him, he’s crying, why does he sound like that?

Of course he sounds like that, that’s what he always sounds like, even when he’s crying instead of acting like a big boy.

...what?

His head hurts so much worse now, like it’s splitting in two. He grabs fistfuls of his hair, pressing the heels of his hands against his temples as he sobs like a child. As a child. He is a child? His head hurts.

“Shhh…” Hands, large but not adult-sized, close around his torso and effortlessly lift him. “Shh, my Cloud, what’s wrong?”

He tucks his face into the crook of a familiar neck, crying harder as his thoughts whirl in painful, jittering loops. _Fear-panic-hate_ fights with _safe-relief-love_ . He knows that voice, but he also _knows_ that voice.

“Hurts,” he manages, though the word is so garbled that it’s nearly incomprehensible. A hand settles on the back of his head, the warmth of it soothing away a little of the pain.

Soothing away pain, not…causing pain. Why would..why…?

“Shh...do you want me to make the hurt go away?”

_No… no no no NO NO NO—!_

“Y-es,” he hiccups, burrowing closer. 

“I can make it go away, but you must trust me, my Cloud. Do you trust me?”

_NO! NO! NO NO NO NO!_

Splitting, spinning pain, opposite impulses pulling apart from the center. An anguished wail tears from his throat as he fights himself, muffled by the shirt his face is pressed against. The stronger impulse wins. He speaks in between gasping sobs. “Yah... t-t’ust you...Sef...”

Warm lips press against his temple. “Good boy,” he croons. “Hush now...”

A sensation like warm black tar oozes between his ears, seeping through the splitting cracks of his psyche. It’s—

_(Relief_

_Terror_

_YEsNOnoPleaSEstOPyESnoTaGAinNO)_

—too much. As fingers card soothingly through his hair, he slips away into the velvet darkness.

* * *

Awareness comes and goes in fits and starts that make his head hurt worse than anything he’s ever felt. And always, _always,_ what follows is those hands and that _voice_ and then blackness in his mind, like dripping lidocaine making all that he is numb and pliant.

Everything hurts and nothing makes sense.

Until it does.

There’s a wooden sword in his hand and an empty mako tank in front of him with a picture of Hojo taped to it, right at his eye level. He pauses mid-swing, baffled. Bewilderment is the only thing that keeps mindless panic from overcoming him because this—he knows this lab.

He’s in Nibelheim. Why is he in Nibelheim? _How_ is he in Nibelheim?

...why is he so small?

“Cloud?” asks a familiar voice, much higher-pitched than it should be. “What is it?”

He half turns, hand clenching around the sword. Sephiroth sits a few feet away, a laptop perched on his crossed legs. Only, _this_ Sephiroth looks to be Denzel’s age, around twelve or so, with rounded cheeks and hair that’s cropped short around his shoulders. 

But his eyes—his eyes are the same ( _the color, the glow, the gleam_ ) and he would know them anywhere. 

Cloud chokes, sword falling to the ground with an echoing clatter. _“Sephiroth_ ,” he rasps, fighting the unfamiliar shape of his mouth to enunciate the words clearly, _“what did you do?”_

Sephiroth stares. After a moment of silence, a pleased smile slowly spreads across his face. “ _There_ you are, my Cloud,” he purrs. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

His eyes are the same.

* * *

The days crawl by in a haze of fear and bewilderment. Cloud slowly comes to realize that something in Sephiroth shifted between this and the last time he killed the man. The tangible edge of insanity is gone, leaving only calm arrogance. There are no speeches about how the planet is his birthright, or about how humans are a scourge that must be eradicated, or about how pathetic Cloud is. In fact, there are no speeches _at all._

He also doesn’t make Cloud suffer for the sake of suffering. To be clear, he does make Cloud suffer, relentlessly and without mercy, but now it is explicitly a means to an end, rather than an end in itself. He wants Cloud to be _strong._

Worse yet, he wants Cloud to willingly join him. If Sephiroth had said such a thing in the scope of a battle, Cloud could have handled it with the business end of his blade and a few dismissive words. But they’re not in a battle, at least not a physical one. The conflict does not end in minutes—it stretches out over days with no end in sight. In the mundanity of their shared life in the empty lab, Sephiroth is patient and amused at Cloud’s stony resistance, as if he’s already won and is just waiting for the blond to realize it.

Cloud worries that he’s right.

* * *

When Cloud is four, he waits for the rare moment when Sephiroth is deeply and truly asleep to sneak out of the mansion. He wishes it was to wake Vincent. The impulse to rouse the former Turk, to have _some_ kind of ally, eats at him, but he locks it away deep in his mind and firmly ignores it. Sephiroth may be only fourteen, but he’s already as strong as he was in his twenty-seven-year-old body. Even if Vincent agreed to get up, agreed to go against Lucretia’s child, Cloud would just be getting him killed.

No, tonight he’s sneaking out for entirely selfish reasons. Yesterday Sephiroth received an order from the President (sent to Hojo, technically) for him to officially join the SOLDIER program. Relations with Wutai were already deteriorating as ShinRa did its damndest to pick a fight. The silver-haired monster told Cloud, in no uncertain terms, that they would be going to Midgar together and burning the mansion to the ground behind them, which makes this his last chance to see his Ma. 

He can’t _really_ see her, of course. Cloud looks so much like Claudia that she would undoubtedly recognize him as the baby she lost three and a half years ago. He can’t afford to give her hope if he wants to keep her safe from Sephiroth. But…he can still _see_ her. He can make the old, aching wound on his heart hurt just a little less. So he sneaks out, his mako enhancements compensating for his toddler body enough to make the trek possible, and goes to their house.

Cloud comes to a standstill at the edge of the back garden, where the yard meets the woods, to find shuttered windows, peeling shingles, and a plot overgrown with tangled weeds. Ma hates weeds in her garden. He knows because he spent his formative years pulling them with her. 

He stares, hope dying in his chest, and doesn’t move for a long time. The house is abandoned. She’s gone.

“Your mother left after you vanished.”

Cloud doesn’t startle at the sound of Sephiroth’s voice. He does feel a pang of bitterness that the man so successfully muffled his presence, though Cloud was hardly on high alert standing and staring at the empty house for gods knew how long. Perhaps he has only himself to blame. 

Hands hook beneath his arms, lifting him until he’s set on Sephiroth’s hip like the toddler he wishes he wasn’t. Tar-like darkness seeps possessively through his mind. He still can’t tear his eyes away from the back door hanging crooked on its hinges. 

“...where’d she go?” he asks hoarsely as his tormentor turns and begins pointedly toting him back to the mansion.

Sephiroth’s voice is mild when he responds. “Would you really want me to know?”

Cloud shuts his eyes and concedes the battle. “No,” he admits in a whisper. “I wouldn’t.”

* * *

Sephiroth stalks the halls of the ShinRa Tower as if he owns them, graceful and arrogant. Cloud trots behind him on his short four-year-old legs, like a little golden chickabo on the heels of a Nibel dragon. ShinRa employees part left and right, cowering before the future Demon of Wutai. Their stares linger on Cloud’s back as the duo makes their way to the President’s office.

It’s a scene out of Cloud’s worst nightmares come to life. To be here in the jaws of ShinRa again, at the height of their power… it’s nearly more than he can stand. The urge to sink into the warm darkness that sits perpetually in the back of his mind is overwhelming; to give in ( _just for a moment_ ) and find relief from the gut-wrenching fury and panic that makes his temples pound in time with his racing heart; to fall into the tranquility of mindlessness and let Sephiroth bear the burden of responsibility in his place…

The bastard knows it too, since he can feel Cloud’s struggle as clearly as if the blond were shouting it. It’s so much harder than it was before. Sephiroth ruthlessly took advantage of those three years when Cloud was most vulnerable to his manipulations, laying a foundation of deep-rooted trust and adoration. As much as Cloud wishes his adult memories could override the memories of his toddler body, he can’t. Where before the call to Reunion had been compelling but deeply foreign, Sephiroth sucessfully turned it into something familiar and safe. There’s no more pain and buzzing static, only steady warmth and a tingling numbness on the back of his tongue.

He has to fight both Sephiroth and himself to keep from giving in.

_My poor, tired boy,_ the darkness whispers laughingly. Cloud glares, struggling to keep his eyelids from drooping in exhaustion. Sephiroth continues to stare straight ahead, pace never slowing. _Don’t you want to rest? Just for a little while? I might even let you wake up again, just to see what you would do._

Anger gives him the extra push he needs to keep fighting. Which, of course, is why Sephiroth said it in the first place. Smug son of a bitch. Cloud lengthens his strides, catching up to the teenager just as he passes into the President’s office. 

Maybe it _is_ hopeless. Maybe he _is_ fighting a losing battle. But he’s damn well going to make Sephiroth pay in blood for every inch of ground he wins. His last name is _Strife_ for a reason.

* * *

He’s six and the killing is wearing him down, but Sephiroth won’t let him stop. More to the point, he won’t let _himself_ stop. He hates it. He hates it so much, knowing what Yuffie would say if she knew, but...despite his best efforts, he’s gotten attached to ShinRa’s SOLDIERs. He wants them to live. He fights for them on two fronts: first, keeping the Wutai soldiers away, and second, keeping Sephiroth happy enough to leave them alone.

It’s not easy. Far more often than he’d ever admit, he simply collapses to the ground at the end of the day and _breathes_ until his mind is as blank as a sheet of paper. His shoulders ache constantly, tense beneath the unrelenting psychological strain. He can’t allow himself to rest. Where one battle stops, another begins. He can only pick himself up and keep going until—

He’s so tired. _So tired._ More than anything—more than living, more than _winning_ —he just wants to rest. For an hour. For a minute. For a _second._

_Just one second, please._

He slips.

Darkness engulfs him, erasing conscious thought until he drifts into a sea of blissful nothing. The weight of awareness lifts from his shoulders. He sinks deeper and deeper into the velvet black as _possession_ wraps around him like a second skin. It’s peace like nothing he’s ever felt before, _safe_ and _wanted_ and _home_. 

_Good boy. Very good boy. Mine, forever. With me, forever. This is where you were always meant to be._

_I wonder…_

_Now that you’ve had a taste..._

_What will you do?_

He wakes as if plunged into fresh snowmelt, sudden and painful and cold. His knives are in his hands, drenched crimson and dripping. A field of mutilated soldiers stretches out before him. The heat of Sephiroth at his back is unmistakable. He stares, trembling. He can’t remember how he got there.

“My Perfect Storm,” Sephiroth murmurs, breath warm at Cloud’s ear, “how wonderfully you rage for me.”

The knives drop from his shaking fingers. He doesn’t have any strength left to fight when Sephiroth cradles him in a mockery of comfort.

* * *

His hands won't stop shaking. He can't make them stop, no matter how hard he grips the fabric of his pants—fingertips numb, knuckles aching from the pressure. He needs to take advantage of Sephiroth's rare absence to stitch his soul back together, but he's too busy rattling apart. The reward for his earlier slip-up (a no-holds-barred battle against the Silver Demon that ended with Cloud unconscious from blood loss) wasn't enough. Worse, it got the attention of Genesis, who'd been safely aloof until now. He can't let them get any closer. He can't let Sephiroth use them against him.

He fights for breath, chest heaving. It’s all he can do to stay quiet enough not to set every SOLDIER in the camp running. He bows over his drawn-up knees, hair falling around his face like a veil. Distantly, he recognizes the signs of a panic attack. Wave after wave of irrational, paralyzing fear washes over him. He can’t remember any of the grounding exercises Tifa taught him.

Is it _irrational_ fear though? He really is failing. The SOLDIERs who are trying so hard to look out for him are in more danger from Sephiroth with each passing day. He's _failing_. And it won't stop with them. He knows full damn well that Aerith and Zack will be next on the chopping block if he doesn't play Sephiroth's game. But he's losing. He's failing. And if Sephiroth wins…

White noise, different but so similar to the warm darkness, floods his ears. Time stutters to a standstill as madness overtakes him. For a perfect, shining moment, the only thing that matters is protecting them, by any means necessary. 

By _any_ means necessary.

He yanks a knife from his belt and brings it down over his heart in a deadly arc.

_No_

His forearm seizes painfully, halting the blade's descent before the tip can do more than split his skin. A bead of blood rolls down his chest, soaking into his shirt. He's held, mind and body, in the grip of a god—gently, so very gently, like a steel hand in a velvet glove, because Sephiroth is neither weak nor clumsy enough to need brute force.

_Oh my Cloud. Are you running away? Are you giving up so soon? Silly boy. Did you really think I would let you end?_

Laughter rolls over his mind like distant thunder. He gasps a sob, unable to even blink, and the world blurs before him. He can feel the phantom sensation of lips at his ear.

_You were always meant to live, my Stormcloud. Now, be a good boy and drop your blade._

Cloud's fingers rise one-by-one as Sephiroth forces them from the hilt of the knife. It bounces off his thigh and drops with a muted thud to the hard-packed dirt. Goal accomplished, the blanketing darkness withdraws, settling back into the periphery of his mind.

He curls into a ball and breaks to pieces, alone in the deep of midnight.

* * *

Later, when Cloud is as limp and wrung out as a dishrag, quiet steps approach. He's too tired to feel anything other than muted gratitude when Angeal's familiar hand brushes his bangs from his face. The teenager most likely thinks Cloud cried himself to sleep. Cloud doesn't bother to disabuse him of the notion. 

The naked blade he dropped is returned to its sheath, then his belts and both knives are removed from him entirely. One arm slides around his back, another beneath his knees. With the care of someone trying not to wake a sleeping child, Cloud is slowly tucked against a warm chest and lifted.

He falls asleep in the gentle rocking of Angeal's steps, and all he can think is _I'm going to get you killed._

* * *

Zack is fourteen and dressed in Third Class blues, fresh-faced and radiant as the sun when he smiles. Cloud turns and bolts, barely hearing Angeal’s surprised shout as he disappears around the corner, pushing himself hard to outpace his babysitter. He pretends it’s the exertion making his chest ache as he hurtles full-speed up the stairwell, heading for the one place no one will think to look for him: Genesis’s apartment.

He’s shaking and glassy-eyed, head ducked to hide his face from the cameras, by the time he swipes his keycard through the electronic lock on Genesis’s door. He slips in, shuts the door behind him, and slides gracelessly to the ground. For a moment he just breathes, staring into the living room. Then the leather couch blurs into a black smear and he’s done for.

_Zack._ Zack is here _._ Young and inexperienced and _alive._ The same Zack who, in another time, would have gladly laid down his life to save Cloud’s. As if Cloud was precious and worth saving. As if he deserved it.

Cloud is going to get him killed.

He’s hyperventilating, slumped against the door. He tries to get up, to move into a position where he won’t choke as easily, but ends up sprawled out on the floor with one elbow holding his weight, hand braced by his head. Ugly sobs, the kind he hasn’t made since Wutai six years ago, wrench from his throat like screams.

_He’s going to get Zack killed again._

“Cloud!?”

Footsteps approach hurriedly, boots clicking across the tile, and then he’s being hauled into a sitting position. A pathetic noise escapes him as Genesis’s face swims into focus for a second. Cloud chose his hiding space poorly, it would seem, but he’s too busy making his mental presence as small as possible to even attempt getting up and leaving.

Sephiroth has noticed Cloud’s state, but he’s busy working and the distance is making it easier for Cloud to hide the exact cause of his distress. The darkness prods, searching, but Cloud makes himself even smaller in his own mind and lets his body do what it wants. With enough time, he’ll be able to force himself back under control.

“Where are you hurt? What happened? Isn’t Sephiroth away on a mission?”

Genesis has never seen him cry, but he has seen him severely injured too many times to count. It’s a reasonable assumption to make, if completely wrong. Cloud giggles hysterically before going back to hyperventilating. 

Goddamn twelve-year-old hormones.

Genesis, kneeling and supporting all of Cloud’s weight, blanches at the sound. “Alright,” he says to himself, pressing his lips into a worried line. “Alright, up we go.” He lifts Cloud effortlessly and carries him into the living room. Hesitating for a moment, he exhales slowly and then settles into a half-reclined position in the corner of the couch. To Cloud’s distant astonishment, Genesis arranges him so that he’s curled up in the man’s lap like a child, something even Angeal rarely dares to try.

Though, to be fair to Genesis, Cloud would have done the same thing if he’d heard Denzel making the kinds of noises that are currently escaping him.

And Genesis is...helping, actually. He’s got Cloud’s head tucked snugly beneath his chin and his arms are curled tight around his torso. It feels like being wrapped up in a SOLDIER-strength compression bandage. Predictably, he’s also reciting Loveless in a slow, even cadence—trying to get Cloud's heart rate to slow down and match the tempo of his voice, the blond realizes. It’s working.

He has no idea how long it takes his body to calm down from its panicked high, but Genesis never once moves. Even when Cloud has gone quiet and still, the arms wrapped around him don’t shift or loosen. Cloud lets it happen. He's exhausted and Genesis isn’t pushing him to talk, so he really has no incentive to get up.

Drifting on the twilight edge of sleep, he hears someone swipe a keycard and let themselves into the apartment. The only two people who can do that are Angeal and Sephiroth, the latter of whom is still miles away, so Cloud doesn’t bother rousing himself to face the music.

“Genesis answer your PHS! Cloud is—”

“Right here, so _hush_. You’re going to wake him.”

Angeal sucks in a startled breath and lowers his voice, sounding bewildered. “I—Gen?”

“I don’t know,” Genesis murmurs. “I don’t know, Angeal. He just came in, an hour and a half ago. I don't think he knew I was home. He was....’upset’ is the nicest way to put it, but given that this is Cloud there’s no other way to describe it than ‘utterly hysterical.’ I thought he was seriously injured at first. He was crying and hyperventilating. I couldn’t get a single word out of him.”

Angeal carefully brushes back Cloud’s bangs, exposing his no doubt red and swollen face. “Oh,” he says softly, as if he didn’t quite believe Genesis until that point. “And he…let you? Comfort him?”

Genesis’s voice turns dry as the desert. “I was as surprised as you are, believe me. Did something happen while he was with you?”

Angeal’s hand settles on Cloud’s jaw, thumb sweeping across his cheekbone in a soothing arc. “No. Or at least, I didn’t see it. One minute we were heading to the gym, the next he was running like his life depended on it.”

Genesis hums, the sound rolling through his chest like thunder. “And I don’t suppose he’d tell us if we asked.”

Angeal just laughs.

* * *

Cloud is fifteen and he’s racing to the end. He’s stronger now than he ever was before, and not just because of the enhancements. Angeal ruthlessly refined his swordplay into near mathematical precision, laying the foundation of basics Cloud had lacked before. Then he’d gone and recruited master swordsmen to teach Cloud styles he’d never even _seen_ before, much less learned. Genesis did much the same with his materia work. On top of that, Cloud made sure he mastered his new body’s physical limits and then pushed them even further.

But he knows that Sephiroth is stronger too, with his physical form and lack of Jenova-induced mental degradation ( _amazing what a fully-functional prefrontal cortex can do to a man_ ). When they spar, Cloud doesn’t hold back _per se_ , but he does know that in a real, final battle, they’ll both fight differently. The day is coming soon. He knows it. Sephiroth knows it. On some level, even Genesis, Zack, and Angeal seem to know it.

“Elbow down, Zack!” Angeal barks, supervising with a critical eye as Cloud and Zack run through a kata faster than the unenhanced eye can see. Sweat pours down Cloud’s face and even without looking over, he knows Zack is no better. It’s worth every burning muscle to dance in lockstep with the friend he could neither save nor keep away.

The end may be coming, but Cloud will hoard every scrap of skill and power he can get his hands on, and he’ll make sure the people he loves do too. What Sephiroth wants will cost him the highest price Cloud can demand. Win or lose, he will pay dearly.

* * *

Cloud is sixteen years old and when he wakes up, he knows.

Sephiroth is on his way back to Midgar from a mission in Kalm. Today is the day Nibelhiem was meant to burn. The weight of inevitability sits in the space around his heart, crushing and liberating in the same moment. The song is winding to a close; the game is finally set to end.

He rises and prepares himself like a warrior of old, groomed for his burial rights, fully prepared to die in honorable battle and step into the afterlife. In the mirror, just for an instant, he sees what Sephiroth must see in himself: a demigod, ancient with the form of a youth. He is golden-haired and radiant, with eyes that belong to no mortal man. 

“You’ve changed,” he murmurs to himself. The mirror is cold beneath his fingertips.

Then he blinks and he’s just Cloud Strife, a weary forty-two-year-old in the body of a teenager. He closes his eyes. Fifteen and a half years of Sephiroth’s dark promises mean nothing to him because he is Cloud Strife, human. Just one human, standing in the breach. The planet is not Sephiroth’s to possess and neither is he. A strange, serene haze settles over him, like the calm before a hurricane.

He eats breakfast with the other Firsts, Angeal and Genesis and now Zack too. They can tell something is off. Zack chatters, confused by his own nervousness. Angeal alternates between trying to calm down Zack and shooting Cloud unreadable looks. Genesis just stares at him shrewdly, staying quiet.

He doesn’t mind. He’s done everything he can for them, including heading off their degradation two years ago. What happens after today depends entirely on who wins the battle. He’s content having kept them alive this long. They were good to him, far better than he deserved, despite the waking nightmare he must have been for the past ten years. He certainly never made it easy on them.

“Cloud,” says Genesis in an overly casual tone as the blond finishes off his last bite of sausage, “why don’t you come with me this morning? There’s a nest of mutated griffons causing trouble in Sector 7. I would appreciate the help.”

“Sorry,” says Cloud, setting down his utensils with a clink of metal on ceramic. “I have something important to do today.”

“I’m sure it can wait until tomorrow.”

“No. It can’t.”

Angeal interjects, coffee cup paused halfway to his lips. “Oh? What’s so important?”

Cloud smiles faintly, rising to take his dishes to the sink. “I’ll tell you tomorrow.”

Zack catches his wrist, stopping him. The eighteen-year-old’s eyes are serious. “...will you?” he asks softly, searching Cloud’s face.

It’s not as if Cloud _wants_ to fail. He’d give anything to win the fight and come back here, to...to do what? Make a home with his friends ( _with his family_ )? The very concept floors him and he quickly pushes it away. He can’t afford to dream like that right now. “I will,” he says, not bothering to hide the gravity of his words.

“Promise?”

“...yeah Zack. Promise."

* * *

He waits out in the wastes, his reforged fusion blade planted in the ground before him. The darkness in the back of his mind buzzes in anticipation, covering him like a possessive film. No one but Sephiroth followed him out here. He made sure of that.

When the Silver Demon comes, he drops from the sky to land lightly before Cloud, black wing outstretched. His eyes shine even in the midmorning sun. He’s excited to the point of giddiness, his ultimate prize laid out in front of him for the taking. For sixteen painstaking years, he’s been waiting to see Cloud’s strength in full bloom; waiting for the ultimate victory, in one form or another.

Cloud can only hope that Sephiroth’s arrogance will be his downfall.

“My Perfect Storm,” Sephiroth says, Masamune materializing in his left hand. He stretches the other out to Cloud in supplication. “All of this for you. Only ever for you. Come, Cloud. Come take your rightful place at my side.”

His words are genuine, which Cloud hates so much that bile burns at the back of his throat. Phantom warmth drips down his skin as the darkness wraps proprietarily around his mind. The depth of Sephiroth’s conviction makes his hands tighten around Tsurugi’s hilt until the leather wrappings creak. He draws in a steadying breath.

“No. I never wanted this, Sephiroth,” he says with quiet finality. 

Slowly, the hand stretched out to him falls. Sephiroth turns his face to the side for a moment, smiling a little. He shakes his head indulgently. “And still, you are like a child playing pretend. So be it.” He draws Masamune up into his favored ready stance. “I will show you the truth until you cannot pretend anymore. Come, dance with me.”

Cloud raises Tsurugi from the dirt and stretches his two symmetrical wings out behind him from where they had been folded up against his shoulders. He doesn’t say anything at all as he launches forward and takes their battle to the sky.

* * *

Each blow they exchange has the force of an earthquake, shaking the ground and sending shockwaves rippling through the air. They move so fast that their blades sing, punctuated by the percussion of clashing metal when they meet. Spells fly in a dizzying conflagration, enveloping them in a mile-wide cloud of smoke and mist and dust as they match each other step-for-step. 

Cloud was right: they’re not fighting as they did in their spars. They’re not even fighting as they did back in their own time. This is entirely new. This fight, more than anything else, makes it painfully clear how much Sephiroth used to toy with him. Minutes stretch into an hour. Blood falls like rain, splattering across the featureless tan landscape beneath their aerial battleground. Cloud is not quite so outclassed this time—Sephiroth is nearly as roughed-up as he is. 

They aren’t exactly being quiet, so inevitably someone takes notice and comes to investigate. A small group gathers and watches from a safe distance, or at least tries to. Given all the debris choking the air and the pure speed of their movement, it’s unlikely that anyone can actually make out who the combatants are. No one has yet dared to interfere with their superhuman skirmish and Cloud doesn’t have the time to figure out who they are, so he ignores them entirely.

One hour turns to two, then three. Sephiroth starts to visibly flag, but Cloud is becoming outright exhausted. His stomach twists itself into knots as he feints to the left and spins into a right-angled strike, only to be sent flying as Sephiroth deftly twists Masamune and counters. He tumbles through the air, unleashing a precise Thundaga to buy himself time, and realizes, _I’m going to lose._

The thought throws him dangerously off balance and his mental control slips. The world flickers to black for a moment as the darkness presses hard against his will, numbing the back of his throat and making his teeth buzz. _Come home,_ it says. _You were always meant to give in to me,_ it says.

He can’t. He _can’t._ He thinks of Genesis and Zack and Angeal. He can’t lose. He can’t give up. He has to find a way to win or _they will die._ He lands hard and launches back up immediately, kicking up a sizable cloud of dust. The ground rumbles beneath him. 

He _has_ to win. Tears prick at the corners of his eyes. There must be some way to win.

“You are almost there, my Stormcloud,” Sephiroth purrs the next time their blades lock, spinning in freefall together. “Almost to the end.”

Cloud snarls like a wild animal, desperation bordering on panic. _“No!”_ Somehow, he finds the strength to send Sephiroth flying away from him. He presses the advantage, materializing above the Silver Demon and bringing down Tsurugi with all his might. Sephiroth gets Masamune up in time, but the impact sends him hurtling toward the ground in an uncontrollable tumble. 

He can’t let them die for his mistakes. He _won’t_ let them die. There has to be some way to win if he just tries hard enough...

_Give him what he wants,_ something that’s neither himself nor the darkness whispers.

He dives, tucking his wings close as he watches Sephiroth hit the ground hard enough to crater it. What the hell is he thinking? He can’t just _give_ Sephiroth the planet. That would kill everyone, and besides, it’s not his to _give._

_No, not the planet. You._

Oh.

_Oh._

He lands in a crouch on the edge of the crater. With two powerful flaps of his wings, he clears away the dust to reveal Sephiroth already standing upright, green eyes alight. He can feel it, the change in Cloud’s goals. A radiant smile, gleaming and victorious, splits his face. _“Cloud,”_ he says, reverent, as the darkness presses in.

Cloud’s hands shake on the handle of Tsurugi, fatigue threatening to take his legs out from under him at any moment. The sob he’s been holding back finally bursts from his chest. He’s out of time. Out of options. All these years of fighting and there’s only one choice left. One path. He can save them, every single one of them. And all it will cost… is himself.

“If you want me,” he manages, the words ripping from his throat with the force of tearing metal, “then you can have me.” Blood drips from a cut at his hairline, glancing off his eyelashes before rolling down his cheek. He blinks rapidly to keep his vision clear. “But you can’t have them too. Not both. Never both.”

Sephiroth’s brilliant, triumphant smile fades. His eyes dart, searching Cloud’s face. For once in his life he seems to be at a loss, unable to understand what Cloud is saying.

“I will _end myself_ fighting you before I let you take the planet,” Cloud continues. “I have that much power, at least. You want me to stand willingly by your side? Forever? I will.” He grits his teeth, drawing in a shuddering breath and fighting to keep his chin up. “But you have to choose,” he chokes out, knowing with painful clarity exactly what he’s offering to the man he hates more than anything. “You can have _me,_ freely, but not both. Never both. So _what do you want,_ Sephiroth?”

Silence falls. The dust begins to settle, revealing their battered, bloodied forms to the onlookers still watching a healthy distance away. Their gazes stay locked, never wavering. The darkness in Cloud’s mind recedes, then surges like the tide. _Willingly?_ it asks. _Forever?_

Cloud has never actually asked Sephiroth what he wants, or at least not in this world. He seems to be baffled by the question. For once, their two-way connection works in Cloud’s favor. He hears snatches of confused, jumbled thoughts: _The planet is mine, but why do I want it? What is the point? What do I want?_

_...what do_ **I** _want?_

“This is not the victory I expected,” Sephiroth murmurs. “At every turn, you surprise me, Cloud.”

And Cloud can’t help it: he laughs. It’s rasping and defeated and tinged with hysteria, but still a laugh. “Sephiroth,” he says, leaning his weight wearily on Tsurugi, “sometimes I wonder if you know me at all.”

_What do I want?_

“...Indeed.”

_I know what I want._

A hand is proffered again, stretched out toward Cloud—not nearly so immaculate this time, and the sentiment has shifted, but the choice is the same. “All this for you, Cloud,” he repeats. “Only ever for you.”

Cloud shuts his eyes for a moment, bracing himself, and raises his hand in return.

_“CLOUD!”_

He startles, having forgotten their audience, and turns automatically to see Genesis, Angeal, and Zack running toward them at full speed, weapons drawn. His mind races suddenly. They’re here, Sephiroth is weakened, maybe they would survive with all three of them and Cloud fighting, maybe they could—

A whisper breaks his train of thought. _“Cloud...”_

He turns back to Sephiroth, hand still half-raised, and searches the man’s face. What he finds there, and what it means to him, only he could say.

He steps forward and lifts Tsurugi, taking the hand outstretched to him. Behind, the other Firsts are seconds away, shouting words he can’t make out. Sephiroth draws him close and folds his wing around them both.

In a flurry of black feathers, they vanish.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please see the next work in the series if you would like me to un-break your heart :)


	6. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bonus epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> >:3c

**Author's Note:**

> [ Come join me on Tumblr for illustrations and updates](https://aimeelouart.tumblr.com/)   
> 


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